first
execute a difficult task, and if he does not succeed he must be content
to forfeit his life.' Many had risked their lives, but in vain. When the
youth saw the King's daughter, he was so dazzled by her beauty, that he
forgot all idea of danger, and went to the King to announce himself a
suitor.

On this he was led out to a large lake, and a gold ring was thrown into
it before his eyes. The King desired him to dive after it, adding, 'If
you return without it you will be thrown back into the lake time after
time, till you are drowned in its depths.'

Everyone felt sorry for the handsome young fellow, and left him alone on
the shore. There he stood thinking and wondering what he could do, when
all of a sudden he saw three fishes swimming along, and recognised them
as the very same whose lives he had saved. The middle fish held a mussel
in its mouth, which it laid at the young man's feet, and when he picked
it up and opened it, there was the golden ring inside.

Full of delight he brought it to the King's daughter, expecting to
receive his promised reward. The haughty Princess, however, on hearing
that he was not her equal by birth despised him, and exacted the
fulfilment of a second task.

She went into the garden, and with her own hands she strewed ten sacks
full of millet all over the grass. 'He must pick all that up to-morrow
morning before sunrise,' she said; 'not a grain must be lost.'

The youth sat down in the garden and wondered how it would be possible
for him to accomplish such a task, but he could think of no expedient,
and sat there sadly expecting to meet his death at daybreak.

But when the first rays of the rising sun fell on the garden, he saw the
ten sacks all completely filled, standing there in a row, and not a
single grain missing. The Ant-King, with his thousands and thousands of
followers, had come during the night, and the grateful creatures had
industriously gathered all the millet together and put it in the sacks.

The King's daughter came down to the garden herself, and saw to her
amazement that her suitor had accomplished the task she had given him.
But even now she could not bend her proud heart, and she said, 'Though
he has executed these two tasks, yet he shall not be my husband till he
brings me an apple from the tree of life.'

The young man did not even know where the tree of life grew, but he set
off, determined to walk as far as his legs would carry him, though he
had no hop